Playground Music is giving away $50 if you buy a Fender Bass Guitar or Fender Electric Guitar worth more than $400. Says you can use the gift card for anything on their store! Trying to see if there’s one that I want…

I’ve always loved the organ… one of the oldest instruments in modern music that is so crucial and instrumental (pun intended), but so often overlooked and unnoticed. One of its most unique characteristics, however, doesn’t come from the instrument itself. It comes from how it’s sound is reproduced: an amplifier known as a Leslie, created by Don Leslie in the ’40s… yeah, the 1940s.

What makes this amp unique is its rotating speakers… yeah, speakers that spin. The rotation simulates a vibrato effect (which is actually a Doppler effect) and gives it a very unique sound. Guitar players really dug the sound and started hooking up their guitars to these cabs.

Up till now, hooking up your guitar to a Leslie has been difficult and clunky, but Hammond, the owner of the Leslie brand, has created the Leslie G37, a Vibratone amp created specifically for guitar players, and it sounds amazing. Check out the two vids below and tell me what you think.

The Guitar player in the vids is Grammy-winning writer Jim Peterik. You may know a few of his songs like, Eye of the Tiger from Survivor and Vehicle from Ides of March. I’ve included a couple of his those vids below, too.

While I’m not Prince’s biggest fan, I sure do admire his current marketing efforts for his latest offerings. And I was surprised to see him on Leno playing… a Fender Stratocaster. That’s right, no purple monster… just a Fender Strat. Check out the video. Be sure to hit the HQ button.

I’m an absolute huge fan of John Mayer for a number of reasons. Sure, many of his songs are pop melodies designed to sell records. But for every song that’s meant to sell he’s got a handful that’s meant to move. I love it that he performs without any thought of how his performance is perceived… he plays just to play. At least that’s how it appears… maybe it’s all show business, but being a musician, I can pretty much guarantee it’s not.

Here’s John Mayer playing Belief, a really cool song off Continuum. This is from Crossroads Guitar Festival 2007. Love the solo – you can literally feel it.

So I’m kind of a vintage guitar lover… I’m no expert, that’s for sure, but there’s something cool about seeing and hearing old guitars. I came across this video of a ’64 SG thru a ’64 Fender Princeton Reverb and wow… what a tone. Needless to say, I was impressed. I’m a Strat lover, but that SG sounds great! Cheers!

So, I was parusing the web today when i visited the online store where I get all my Fender Gear including strings and such. They upgraded their Fender page a bit and hopefully, it’s a sign of things to come. These folks are great people and really, really knowledgable. Check ’em out:

So, call this blog anything you want, but at at least I’m eclectic. I stumbled across this amazing young artist who is popularizing a unique instrument, the Ukelele. This girl’s from Hawaii and is already traveling around the Pacific and West Coast of the US.